


In the name of being brave

by Waistcoat35



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Art References, Domestic Fluff, Feels, Flashbacks, Fluff, M/M, Mind Palace, Oc plays a very minor role, Sort Of, Summer, Tw: Scars mentioned, Tw: lowkey PTSD mention, Y'all gonna have to deal with it this fic wasn't written for you, all that good shit, beach, hand holding, slight angst, still extremely fluffy though!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-24 10:17:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15628563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waistcoat35/pseuds/Waistcoat35
Summary: This is a birthday gift to my very dear friend, @wildenessat221b! Hope you like it!





	In the name of being brave

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wildenessat221b](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildenessat221b/gifts).



> This is a birthday gift to my very dear friend, @wildenessat221b! Hope you like it!

The sound of the sea over sand wasn’t dissimilar to warm morning breaths painting their fronds over cool skin, both of which were sounds Sherlock had learned only recently. He shifted atop the golden grains, thin dress shirt adding a layer of baking warmth to scarred skin even with the sleeves rolled up; it was a small miracle his dignity had even allowed _that_ small trifle.

However, he’d had a little… ( _“come on, roll those bloody sleeves up – can’t have my favourite detective getting heatstroke, can I, love?)_ persuasion from John. Although, to John’s palpable disappointment (and not just due to the risk of heatstroke) the remainder of the garment was staying exactly where it was.

_Not_ because of bullet scars or lash-marks or the remnants of that incident with the Irishwoman and the machine gun and the cornfield in Serbia. Of course not. ( _Awful-horrible-shameful-can’t-let-him-see-please-god-no.)_

Speaking of the Irishwoman – he’d best write back to her, hadn’t he?

John had disappeared some time ago, Sherlock vaguely recalling something about ice cream being said in that clear, unassumingly dulcet tone (as with a cat soaking up sunlight, he preferred to focus on the voice itself rather than what it was actually _saying_. Unfortunately, John just classed this as Sherlock not listening to him again.) The tide wasn’t approaching at a speed even as great as the level of his tolerance for Anderson, so if he were to escape to his mind palace to jot a postcard for later, it was unlikely there would be an incident reminiscent of the last one. (John wasn’t even bothered he’d almost drowned in the bath, he was just unhappy about the cost of refitting the damn _door_.)

Since their outing to the national gallery together, he’d been deleting far less about trivial matters, especially if they were ones John had an interest in. As he walked up to the house, he reflected on the chatter and the pictures of them in front of paintings, probably still saved on John’s phone, and the fact that every time he looked into a glass case he could see the reflection of their hands intertwined. He found himself smiling, a miniscule, unsheltered pearl of a grin pried at last from its oyster; a small vial of alkali to years of waiting and restrained touches and rejections still pulsing in his veins, running through his mind like bitter poison.

He rounded Lowry’s Clitheroe streets, weaved around matchstick men and darting dogs, climbed stone stairways onto bridges and admired Van Gogh’s stars as he crossed them. Once in the manor, he fished around for her last letter.

_Dear Mr Holmes,_

_I am well after the incident overseas, but I thank you for your enquiry. May you lack any new injuries and/or emotional scarring. As for my brothers – the eldest is still a bossy old sod. (Though he means well.) The youngest still isn’t talking to me, and the middle one is still dead. As a doornail, I might add. A doornail that has been shot several times. I wish that wasn’t the most I had to tell you. By the way, how are things with that blogger of yours?_

He stopped – read the line, reread it once more.

_Your_ blogger.

_Yours_.

That couldn’t be true – could it?

He had years of evidence to prove her wrong, backward flinches and hesitant touches and furious denials to anybody who picked out any insinuation of a _we_ or an _us_.

But he also had a midnight bus ride to a sudden case, he had the anticipation of a new case thrumming through his veins mixed with a new kind of adrenaline as a weary John had fallen asleep, head resting on Sherlock’s shoulder and body half-leaning into him, the two sensations forming a bizarre and wondrous cocktail unrivalled by any of the liquid comforts he had turned to over the years.

He had the soft new musk that had set into his scarf over a matter of months, clouding him in an ecstatic mist of _John_ -ness whenever he dipped his chin and breathed in.

He had the soft, almost _proud_ glow in John’s eyes whenever he introduced him as his partner.

_His_.

_Yours_.

_Ours_.

_Us_.

He was pulled from his reverie by something cool and sweet-smelling dripping onto his nose, and opened his eyes to find an ice cream being held towards his face, and slowly melting. Considering the sun-like qualities of the face obscured by it, he wasn’t surprised.

“You in there again? Good thing the tide wasn’t coming in, otherwise we could’ve had another one like-“

He shot up, snatching the ice cream (considering it meant their hands touched again, he should’ve taken it far more slowly) and giving John a warning look.

“Johnestly, dear, the new door wasn’t _that_ expensive.”

“It was _pine_ , Sherlock!”

“You’re not allowed to call me uncultured if I elect to delete your oncoming lecture on wooden doors and their various price tiers, I hope.”

“Now, hold on just a minute-“

It didn’t matter he’d been suddenly evicted from his mind palace (that seemed to happen rather easily nowadays, but only when John was the one knocking. How strange.) because he knew just what to write on his friend’s postcard.

_Dear Kenneth,_

We _are very much alright._


End file.
